Instagram tells you who you are.
The information Instagram has on me surprised me, but also not so much. I was able to view all the passwords changed I’d made, down to the date, hour, and minute, former email addresses, former phone numbers, date of birth, current follow requests, the accounts that follow me and that I follow, hashtags I follow, accounts I’ve blocked or hidden stories from, former usernames, former full names, former bio texts, former links in bio, every single login, once again down to the very minute, every single logout, my search history (unless I intentionally clear it), all the polls, emoji sliders, questions, music questions, countdowns, and quizzes I interacted with, and lastly, all ads interests. Some of these surprised me to an extent, where I was kind of taken aback to see how they’ve kept a record of sorts of all account and stories activity on my Instagram, and even logged the time too. While it did feel nostalgic to look back on former usernames or bio texts, for example, (as I was young when I first got Instagram), it did feel weird. It was like every single thing I’d ever searched up or written, regardless of whether or not I’d deleted it (and really thought I’d never see it again), it was recorded. And it wasn’t going anywhere. I was looking back at activity from years ago, some of which I frankly don’t remember writing or posting. Also, when I really think about it, things like former full names are rather reflective of my persona, especially from years ago. In this way, this isn’t just a record of my social media activity, but an echo of my personality and the ways in which it’s shifted over time. And no matter what, once it’s been written, it’s not going anywhere. Certain aspects of my persona then and now has been infused into my social media and are, basically, recorded and out there. That’s insane to think about. Another part that I didn’t expect was Ad Interests. There was some sort of record out there of all the types of Ads I’d ever interacted with. That’s probably what most surprised me. Even the most remote interaction with an Ad put me into a certain category that led to a chain of other Ads that I would inevitably view from then on. Overall, reflecting on these things that most impacted me, it feels as though I, together with countless others, are merely being characterized and put into certain boxes based on reactions to what social media presents. For example, if I don’t interact, I don’t fit into a certain box, but if I do, I fit into another box, and they show me all of that meticulously laid out. Even though I don’t use social media much, little by little, allocating all of these seemingly little details unavoidably paints me as a certain person, one that can arguably reflect my true character, all from small actions and reactions recorded on my social media.
